Chapter 16
“Itell you, the woman is relentless,” Tristan said as he paced the length of Henry’s billiard room. “Lady Montfort is bent on seeing her nieces married off, and she means to use every lever at her disposal, including, apparently, me.”
Henry straightened and chalked his cue, then surveyed the table as if what Tristan had said was ordinary. “It is the natural state of the world, Tristan. Women seek husbands, men seek to avoid being trapped. The universe is in balance.”
“She is not even subtle about it,” Tristan pressed on, ignoring the jest. “I cannot set foot at any gathering without being forced to endure some tedious female accomplishment. Yesterday at the garden party was no different.”
“I heard Dawnford was there.” Henry lined up another shot, frowned, and let it go.
Tristan’s teeth snapped together audibly. “Dawnford was everywhere. Like a parasite, he latched onto Lady Lavinia from the moment she arrived.”
“She is a grown woman,” Henry observed, making a clean shot. “And not your responsibility. Unless there is something you have not told me.”
“Of course, there is nothing,” Tristan said, coming to a halt at the end of the room. “But I have a duty to Sophia. If her tutor is compromised by some scoundrel—”
“You could simply fire her,” Henry interrupted, taking a drink from the sideboard without bothering to offer one to Tristan. “You are a Duke. Dukes can do anything, short of murder, and even then, only if it is not a peer.”
Tristan ran a hand through his hair. “It would upset Sophia. She is more attached to Lady Lavinia and dismissing her now would undo significant progress.”
“Then let her be courted,” Henry suggested, making another shot. “If the prospect of a marriage to Dawnford so horrifies you, perhaps you should offer for her yourself.”
“Do not be ridiculous,” Tristan snapped, turning so sharply his boots scuffed the Turkish carpet. “It is the very last thing I would do. The entire point of hiring a governess was to avoid these sorts of entanglements.”
“Yet here you are,” Henry said, sinking another ball with a perfect bank shot, “entangled.”
Tristan glared at him. “You do not understand. Dawnford is a menace. He has left a trail of ruined women from here to Scotland, and for all her intelligence, Lady Lavinia is no match for that kind of duplicity.”
Henry arched an eyebrow, resetting the balls for another round. “And you believe you are?”
Tristan folded his arms. “I know his sort. I was his sort, once. He does not care about her. He wants what he cannot have, and the moment she is compromised, he will disappear.”
“Perhaps,” Henry mused, aiming another shot, “you should let her decide for herself. She is not without wit. She might surprise you.”
“She has already surprised me,” Tristan said, softer now, “by not running as far and as fast as possible from this wretched existence. I would have, in her place.”
Henry missed his shot for the first time all evening. The cue ball rolled to a stop at Tristan’s feet.
“You are being absurd,” Tristan said, snatching the cue and rolling it between his palms. “This is not about me. I simply will not see Sophia’s future jeopardized by a string of maternal failures.”
Henry watched him, silent for a moment, then said, “You know, for someone who claims to care only for the future of his daughter, you have a remarkable interest in the private affairs of her tutor.”
Tristan rounded on him. “Are you suggesting—”
“I am not suggesting anything,” Henry said, raising his glass in mock salute. “But it is curious that you have spent the last ten minutes railing against Dawnford, when it is obvious to anyone with eyes that Lady Lavinia cannot stand the man.”
“She was polite enough at the party.”
“Polite, yes. But not interested. Whereas you, my friend, are very interested. So interested that you are here, at my house, inventing reasons to speak of her rather than minding your own business.”
Tristan gripped the cue stick so hard he nearly splintered it. “You are insufferable, Henry.”
“I am practical,” Henry said. “It is why I am the only man in London whose estate turns a profit.”
Tristan paced the length of the windows, pausing only when he could not bear another step without exploding. “She is not for me.”
“Why not?”
He stopped. “Because I do not intend to marry again. Ever.”
Henry snorted. “You sound like a villain in a gothic novel. I do not believe a word of it.”
Tristan spun on his heel. “I am not some lovesick fool who needs to be rescued by the first petticoat that blows in the door. I am a Duke. I have a legacy. My life is not my own to gamble away on romantic whim.”
Henry’s eyes narrowed. “Then why do you care what happens to her?”
Tristan opened his mouth, then closed it. The silence hung between them, heavy and unyielding.
Henry set down his drink and leaned on his cue. “You could have any woman in England. You could even have Lady Lavinia, if you wished. But instead, you stand here, gnashing your teeth over Dawnford. Why?”
Tristan could not answer. He could not even look at Henry.
“Is it because you want her for yourself?” Henry asked, voice as gentle as a scalpel. “Or because you want her to be free, to make her own choices? You cannot have both.”
The question hovered in the air, unanswerable.
Henry watched him for a long moment, then sighed. “You are my oldest friend. I would offer advice, but you never take it.”
Tristan glared at the cue stick, then set it down. “You are no help, Henry. None at all.”
“That is what friends are for,” Henry replied, his lips curving into a half-smile. “To tell you when you are being a complete idiot.”
Tristan turned and strode toward the door with the suppressed violence of a storm about to break.
“Tristan,” Henry called after him, “try not to do anything too foolish!”
The door slammed behind him.
Tristan had no recollection of ordering his carriage to Pembroke Manor. One moment, he was pacing Henry’s library, the next, he was standing before the empty fireplace of the drawing room, resisting the urge to fidget.
Then footsteps reached him and he straightened, taking a moment to breathe before turning around.
Lavinia entered, but paused abruptly when she registered him.
Her dark hair was pinned more severely than usual, but a few strands had escaped and were now framing her face.
The effect was not one of disarray, but of defiance—a refusal to be perfectly tamed.
She dipped a curtsy, not too deep, and straightened. “Your Grace.”
“Lady Lavinia.” He inclined his head, but the words, which had arranged themselves neatly in his mind during the ride, scattered at her entrance.
A moment passed. The hush between them was not silence, but a thrum.
“Forgive the intrusion,” he said, surprised by the roughness of his own voice. “I was passing through and thought—” He stopped. He could not say what he thought. He did not know.
She smiled, polite but wary. “I hope your business in town was satisfactory.”
“Yes. Quite.” He cleared his throat. “How is Sophia?”
Her expression softened, and she gestured for him to sit. “She is well. She completed her landscape study this morning. I suspect she will begin pestering the stonemason for marble before long.”
He allowed himself a small smile and sat at her suggestion. She took the facing chair, hands folded in her lap.
“She has a talent for watercolor,” Lavinia said. “But she is afraid of it. She prefers to hide behind technique.”
“She is her father’s daughter,” Tristan said. “We are raised to think of creativity as a luxury. In my family, it was regarded as a defect.”
Lavinia’s eyebrows lifted. “How unutterably dull.”
He could not help it; he laughed. It startled him. He realized, with a small shock, that it was the first time he had genuinely laughed since—
He banished the thought.
“I hope you do not think me neglectful,” he said. “I have no gift for managing Sophia’s... development.”
“I do not think you neglectful,” Lavinia replied, and it sounded almost like kindness. “But perhaps a little too concerned with the outcome.”
“Is that a failing?”
“In this case? No,” she said, “but sometimes the outcome is less interesting than the attempt.”
He looked at her then, really looked. The line of her jaw, the determined set of her mouth.
And he remembered, with vivid clarity, the moment in the garden when he had caught her, blindfolded, and felt the shock of contact run through both of them.
The memory was so immediate that it stole his breath.
He remembered her gasp, the heat of her skin, the way his hands had not wanted to let go.
But it was the scent—something floral, not quite rose—that pulled him further back, to another night, another room.
The masquerade. The mysterious woman in the amethyst pendant, the one who had seemed to know him by touch alone.
For an instant, the memories overlaid, and it was as if the masked woman and Lady Lavinia were—
He jerked his head as if stung.
She noticed. “Are you well, Your Grace?”
He struggled for composure. “A twinge. Old injury. Nothing to concern you.”
She studied him as if his expression would give her an answer, then nodded.
“I’m afraid I must apologize,” he said, scrambling for the rails of the conversation. “I have interrupted your day.”
“You have,” Lavinia replied, “but only as much as any other emergency at this address. Today, it was a burst pipe.”
He arched a brow. “You manage the estate yourself?”
She lifted her chin. “Who else is there to manage it?”
“A solicitor. A steward. A meddling relative,” he said, but the last was a joke and she caught it.
“Our solicitor is a shambles, our steward is eighty-seven, and the only relative interested in the estate is Lady Montfort, whose methods you have already experienced. That leaves me.”
He admired her for it. She was unbreakable.
“You are formidable,” he said.
She laughed, the sound as light and quick as the step of a wren. “That is a word often used by people who wish I were less so.”
He leaned forward. “I do not wish it. It suits you.”
The color rose in her cheeks, then faded. She changed the subject. “Is there something specific you wish to discuss?”
Yes, he thought, but the words would not come. Instead, he said, “I wanted to ensure you were not troubled by Dawnford. He has a reputation—”
“I am aware,” Lavinia said. “And I assure you, I am not in need of a protector.”
He blinked, startled by the rebuke.
She relented after a beat. “I thank you for the concern, truly. But Lord Dawnford holds no interest for me.”
He nodded, suddenly unsure of himself. The air in the room grew thick, as if the house itself was holding its breath.
“I should not have come,” he said, standing abruptly. “Forgive my intrusion.”
She stood too, closing the distance between them. For a moment, neither moved. Then she said, very quietly, “Your Grace—why did you come?”
He opened his mouth, closed it, then said the first truth that entered his mind. “I do not know.”
She looked at him, long and level, then smiled in a way that was more resignation than joy. “Well,” she said, “if you figure it out, I would like to know as well.”
He bowed—an old-fashioned gesture, but somehow necessary—and made for the door. His hand was on the knob when it burst open and Lady Montfort walked in, trailing a cloud of orris root and righteous ambition.
She stopped dead at the sight of him, then dropped into a curtsy so deep it verged on parody. “Your Grace! What a surprise. Lavinia, why did you not summon your sister? Surely, she would wish to pay her respects.”
Tristan recovered his composure. “There is no need, Lady Montfort. My business here was brief.”
“Nonsense!” she declared, straightening with the bounce of a woman half her age. “Frances is in the rose parlor. Lavinia, go and fetch her at once. Tell her the Duke of Evermere is here. And tidy your hair.”
Lavinia stood her ground. “Lady Montfort, I do not think—”
“Go, go,” Montfort hissed, waving her hand as if to shoo away a fly. “You see how she is, Your Grace? Impossible, utterly impossible. I do hope you have more luck with Sophia.”
Tristan’s jaw clenched. “I find Lady Lavinia’s methods highly effective, Lady Montfort.”
Montfort’s face pinched. “If you say so. But a softer approach might—oh, never mind. Men are so stubborn.”
She moved closer, lowering her voice. “If I may be blunt, Your Grace: Lavinia is not for the likes of Dawnford. She requires a man of principle, of stability. Someone who can tame her pride. I have often thought—”
He cut her off. “Lady Montfort, I assure you, Lady Lavinia is perfectly capable of choosing for herself.”
Montfort’s eyes gleamed with calculation. “Yes, well. If you should ever wish for an ally, you know where to find me.”
He bowed again, colder this time, and turned for the door.
Montfort called after him, “Please convey my best to Lady Sophia! And do come again soon. We are always delighted to receive you.”
Tristan escaped to the carriage, the echo of Lavinia’s voice trailing him like a perfume: If you figure it out, I would like to know as well.
The drive back to Evermere was long, and for the first time in memory, he dreaded the arrival. The house would be as it always was: silent, ordered, a monument to the duties that had shaped his life.
But the memory of that afternoon—the light in her eyes, the tremor in her laugh—clung to him like a wound that refused to heal.
He could not stay away, and he could not go back.
He was, for the first time, utterly at a loss.